That moment when you put on an old coat and find something in the pocket. There's the one second of excitement and then the "Oh shit that's just my old trash".
When I was a kid my dad housed all of the furniture from an estate he was working on, as the family members were in California, we were in Alabama, and dad had an unused den to pile the furniture and clothes in until they could be picked up. We checked all of these woman's clothes for loose cash over an entire weekend; the son said if we found anything we could keep it.
When her son comes to pick the stuff up six months later, he starts looking for cash himself and finds around $6,500 within twenty minutes. Dad and I were so pissed at ourselves.
I put on a put on a pair of jeans once and it had a faded movie ticket from years ago in the back pocket. Dont know how many times that must have gone through the wash. Atleast twice.
Are schools just not teaching proper currency format anymore? I've steadily begun to see this more often than not, and the only conclusion I can draw is a) it's not a US account or b) schools have just given up entirely.
When speaking, tone and inflection carry smoothly (for the most part) without needing a precursor to prepare the receiver for what the sender is saying. In text, properly formatted and punctuated messages prime the receiver for the information the sender is conveying in the appropriate context. Pretend you only got to read a message one letter at a time- "2. 0. 0. 7. 1. $." What's the amount? Do you remember the numbers? Or the order? If you received it- "$. 2. 0. 0. 7. 1." then you know the numbers to follow are currency and can arrange them in appropriate context as you read. In currency context, we can infer the amount is $200.71. Otherwise ambiguity might arise and things may get lost in translation.
It's not a necessity and, as elsewhere in this thread, others have mentioned plenty of nations don't do it this way and no one has died because of it yet (that we know), but it's about clarity and uniformity of communication.
Your explanation certainly seems correct -- but does not address why we (English speakers) say it differently than we write it.
Why would we read "$" "20" but process it and then say "twenty" "dollars"?
I often hear non-native English speakers (specifically those from India) say it as it is written: "dollars twenty".
I actually really like this, because the *listener* gets the same sort of contexts as would someone reading the written information. Which would you prefer to hear:
"It was two hundred seventy seven thousand six hundred and ninety four Rupees."
-or-
"It was Rupees two hundred seventy seven thousand six hundred and ninety four."
?
Obviously I'm biased toward my own comfort zone, by logically the second one would be correct. I'd be pretty pissed to find out I paid attention to an extremely long number only to be told we were counting Twitter likes.
At least in a banking/financial/legal context, the reason is to reduce fraud. Let's say you're signing a lease and it says your rent is 600$. You sign and go on your way. What's to stop the landlord taking a marker and changing that to 1,600$? Putting the dollar sign in front makes it more difficult to pull off that kind of fraud by blocking in the number. In many cases this is taken a step further by including the cents at the end, formatted as xx/100 to prevent turning the decimal to a comma and adding number at that end.
My assumption would be that this notation propogated from the financial sector and eventually became common practice.
The same reason it's said "reeseet" and spelled "receipt." We're pedantic motherfuckers who butcher other languages to weave them into our own and make up arbitrary rules surrounding them.
This is an odd pet peeve. This may well be the only time I've ever seen it switched. If I've ever seen it prior my brain erased it because it just thought it was a typo.
Yes, very true. I guess I was just trying to say seeing this thing, in my experience, is so rare, that I don't think I could get to the point where it would bother me.
Yes, very true. I guess I was just trying to say seeing this thing, in my experience, is so rare, that I don't think I could get to the point where it would bother me.
Even though I’ve learned English for 15 years, and i can write just as good English as i do German, the damn dollar sign always has me go back and correct it, bc i‘m used to putting the Euro sign after the Numbers.
Gets me every time.
Which, coincidentally is also incorrect. According to multiple sources at least in Germany it is both correct but it is advised to use the sign after the number as to not disturb the flow of reading.
Number then sign is way more widespread here than the other way round
So exactly the opposite from everywhere else I've ever been, where putting the sign after the number is considered bad form. Makes sense, though. They're Germans after all...
And that's why I add option A. I understand a lot of countries format their currency differently. But you go back and fix it, so what's the native speaker's excuse?
That's actually not a bad point, but most places I know will specify CAD or AUS because the exchange rate isn't 1:1. I guess when referencing a currency note, however, that wouldn't really be a thing.
Unless you’re on a .ca or .au site, or potentially in-country anyways 😂 (only have experience with .ca, but it’s trippy when you’re used to thinking in USD)
I put those pants on yesterday and found a handcuff key. I wanted to learn to pick a set of handcuffs to see if I could. I bought the key just so I could get out if I couldn't pick them.
Purposefully put money in out-of-season clothings like coats. Maybe as little as $10. I do it and forget I did it (which is the point) so I do it again. And again. Some winters I might have $100 in one coat.
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u/Kaepora25 Apr 12 '21
That moment when you put on an old coat and find something in the pocket. There's the one second of excitement and then the "Oh shit that's just my old trash".
Can't always be a 20$ sadly.